There is a constant deliberation amidst the Robotics community: can humanoid bots be really developed? If they can be, would they be capable of emulating human behavior or even perhaps match the competencies displayed by the human brain to some extent?
The answer to these questions can be further explored through the development of the first Android based humanoid bot by Professor Oh Jun-Ho, on behalf of Korea Advanced institute of science and technology, with the lower body of a bipedal frame, that of a robot, while keeping the head of a human(Albert Einstein in this case). The capabilities of this humanoid bot, though limited, include features such as independent eye movements on both the eyes, facial gestures, voice recognition and synthesis apart from movement freedom on more than 3 independent axes. There has also been a development of the HUBO 2 by the same organisation on similar scales as the upgraded version to HUBO also known as Albert HUBO.
The robot is specially known for its facial gestures which are closely matched to the more than 1000 facial gestures that the human face is capable of. Also another remarkable feature of this bot is the capability to produce a synthesized voice on the patterns of the voice of the famous physicist Albert Einstein. The bi-pedal frame is capable also of matching the human type walking movement though it is still at very slow speeds, which in turn are a remarkable feature for such a frame.
The technicalities of this bot are also a benchmark in this industry with various motors and special sensors put in place to monitor and to react to situations on real time basis. It uses two on-board PC104 processors and solid state drives for faster instruction processing power and retrieval. The left one can control the entire robot, taking care of functions such as walking and overall stabilization; the right one on the other hand is normally empty and one can load speech, vision, and navigation algorithms.
Such humanoid bots are a great leap in terms of human based interactions because such bots can be very readily deployed in the future in places of public interest to interact with live humans and perhaps provide more options and benchmarks in terms of the human-bot interaction in a more informal manner.
The advancements in technology have amazed everyone world wide, and the most astonishing developments over the past few years were in Atlas. Atlas are humanoid robots which are developed mainly to assist or carry out search and rescue tasks. Boston Dynamics, an American company, are developing the Atlas to assist The United States army.
The Atlas was developed from Boston Dynamics first version which was called Petman. The design are somehow identical in terms of the limbs (4 hydraulic limbs), material (Aluminium and Titanium), height (1.8 m) and weight (330 pounds). The vision system that is implemented in the Atlas is a laser rangefinder and stereo cameras.
Huge progress was made in the past 2 years, and with billions of dollars being funded to Boston Dynamics by the Unites States Defense Advanced Research Projects Team (DARPA), we are to expect these Robots to carry emergency services in search operations or even rescue. The Atlas is mainly being developed to carry out operations where humans can not survive due to the environment. Atlas is still in the beginning of the development stages as a lot of advancements and improvements are still needed to be made. One of the issues that they still face till now is that Atlas still falls down a lot, but by time more and more developments are improving its balance.
Asimo, which stands for Advanced Step in
Innovative Mobility, is not the first humanoid robot, but as his name predicts he
has been the leader in a wide range of innovations. He made his first
appearance in October 2000 and over the years it has been presented with several
new features. Honda, its developer, wanted to provide the world with a robot
that would add value to our society. So they invented a new type of
robot, one not related to the business environment, that could help people in their
daily life. That it is why Asimo is only 1.2 meters tall, so he can move around
easily in spaces that are occupied by humans, but he can still reach for certain
objects, like switches or doorknobs. His size also contributes to the fact that
he has a very attractive appearance, almost human-like.
One of the technologies that also contribute
to its human appearances is the Predicted Movement Control. Combined with
the already existing technologies it makes him move with great flexibility and
smoothness as you can see in the video. It results in an intelligent real-time flexible way of walking, easily
making changes of direction, and responding to sudden movements. It is ably to
steer clear from a person or, contrary, to approach someone to great him or her. Over the
years his movements have become more and more stable, enabling him now to even run up to
3.7 mph, kicking a football, or running up and down stairs.
Recognizing moving objects, postures,
gestures, sounds and faces are other features that make him resemble a human
being. As it can interact with us, he really starts to grow on us, like a pet,
or maybe like a real friend. Even though his two eyes are just cameras, they
give him a actual face, and most importantly they make sure that he captures
everything that happens around him, detecting movements of multiple objects or
determining distance and direction. It can even follow us around, like a little dog.
But you never have to clean up after him. Nor feed him, because he will know when his
51.8V lithium ion battery needs to be charged, and by himself he will return to his charger
point. Also, thanks to its voice interpretation, it will listen to your voice
commands as well as to gestures. The voice
recognition will even allow him to distinguish several people, so it will know
when you’re with friends and invite them to a cup of tea. Works better than a boyfriend.
In 1971, the first attempt was made to land a rover on Mars. At the time, NASA
experienced more failure than success. Of course by now we are finding more and more answers to the questions that continue to surround Mars. Rover development has made such technological strides since then. Each robot has specific capabilities, based on what NASA determines best suits the rover's mission. The long term goals that NASA has set for these rovers are to discover characteristics of Mars' climate, geology, and resources to determine if life has been, or could ever be, supported by the planet. Additionally they are preparing for human exploration of the planet.
The first
two Mars rovers were launched in 1971 and were developed by Russia, but
both attempts failed, as neither of them had a successful landing. On July 4, 1997, the American Mars Pathfinder landed and succeeded in doing some exploration until losing contact three months later. In 2003, the Beagle 2, Spirit and Opportunity were also launched. Up to this point, the Curiosity has been the most successful attempt to explore Mars. It was launched on November 26,
2011 and arrived to Mars on August 6, 2012. Today the rover is still operable and keeps on giving us new insights on the peculiarities of Mars.
Curiosity
is doing different kinds of biological, geological and geochemical research, in addition to studying the planetary processes and surface radiation. Curiosity's goals are as follows: to determine whether Mars could have ever supported life,
the role of water, the study of the climate and the geology of Mars and
the prospects of human exploration. In order to achieve these goals the Mars
rover has an impressive collection of tools. It not only has it got a wide range of
different cameras installed, but it can also drill in the Martian soil to extract samples, which can be analyzed by the robot itself. As it has its own space laboratory installed, it is able to study the samples it took and send the information to earth.
But it is not only the
amazing technology that the Mars rover contains that makes it so special. The process it took to land it is also extraordinary. The rover travels in a spacecraft at enormous speed from earth to Mars and the challenge is to slow it down before touching the surface, without any human intervention. It takes 14 minutes for communication to
travel to Earth, but the landing process only takes 7 minutes - from the moment the spacecraft reaches the Martian atmosphere to landing safely and soundly on the surface. Every step throughout this extremely sophisticated
and every step of the very tense Entry Descent Landing process has to be pre-programmed. This
takes 500.000 lines of COD3 programming with a zero margin for error.
The
spacecraft is first slowed down by the atmosphere, but because the Martian
atmosphere is much thinner that the one we have at earth, it is not enough. Therefor, NASA invented the biggest and strongest supersonic parachute ever
made. This parachute is slowing the shuttle down to 200 mph, but it is still not enough. So during its decent, it gets rid of the heat shield needed for passing
through the atmosphere, getting the rocket motors are ready to rock. The shuttle has to make a quick diversion to clear from the parachute that is being detached and in this maneuver it kills the remaining velocity. The
radar will start looking for its predetermined spot to land and the moment of truth is drawing near. But the rocket motors can’t breach the surface. The rover will thus be lowered down by cables and land
on its own ‘feet’. Than the cables are cut off and the shuttle is able to speed away to
make sure it doesn't damage the precious rover. All of this happens without
human intervention; everything is programmed. These are called the ‘7 minutes of terror’, in which we on earth are hoping no errors have been made during the years and years of preparation.
An ant alone has enough strength to lift a weight that is 10 times its own, it does so to carry food from the place where it finds it to the nest. Imagine now a swarm of ants looking for food, together they have the power to coordinate and lift food that is proportionally big, and also the swarm enables the ant to hunt a prey that is too big for a single ant to hunt upon. This methodology of the swarm works not only at this micro level but also at a macro level where animals such as lions or hyenas hunt in groups to be more effective. Even the human species during the initial stages of development used to hunt in groups.
The swarm gives you the multitude of effects such as strength, intelligence and many others.
What if you could have a swarm of robots that could do the same work in a manner unapprehensive to a single robot. This is what Wiki says about swarm robotics:
"Swarm robotics is a new approach to the coordination of multirobot systems which consist of large numbers of mostly simple physicalrobots. It is supposed that a desired collective behavior emerges from the interactions between the robots and interactions of robots with the environment. This approach emerged on the field of artificial swarm intelligence, as well as the biological studies of insects, ants and other fields in nature, where swarm behaviour occurs."
The recent trends in robotics today is too get multiple robots to work together, but at the moment these parallel working robots don't work as desired because of collisions and noise effects. Some tasks are too tough for a robot to solve on its own and that is when the idea of the swarm kicks in. Basically the idea is to have multiple robots synchronized to add up in effectiveness, like the ants they work together side by side, distributing different tasks to reduce time and the amount of work. Not a moment they will block each others way, and everything looks like a well-oiled machine.
The algorithmic format in which a swarm is built, is too tedious to understand at this macro level. Yet to give you an idea how it works we will explain a bit of the basic terminology. The type of programs written for the swarm generally are designed in a manner to sequentially carry out a command and avoid the possibility of a deadlock. This is done by sensors used in the robot that can detect the robots in the proximity and then carry out the task by forming a group. The advantages of swarms are huge but the morphology in how to work coordinated as a swarm is still new, and the various sensors have their own range and the algorithms sometimes cannot capture the action that is to be carried out due to the numerous conditional branching.
Here is a video to give you a glimpse of what a swarm is capable of. Enjoy!!
I have been to my fair share of hospital emergency rooms,
including one interesting trip to an ER in Seoul, South Korea (which is a story
for another day). Luckily enough, these visits were usually minor and involved
some level of stupidity on my end. For
those of us who have been less fortunate, hospital visits have involved some
sort of surgical procedure. From a routine outpatient podiatry procedure that
lasts less than a half hour to a complex cardiothoracic surgery that takes
multiple days and requires an inpatient stay of months, surgery can be scary,
painful, and costly. The fact is that the patient must trust the doctor with his limb, his heart, or even his life. While
surgeons are able to safely perform operations today that healthcare
professionals could have only dreamed of twenty years ago, complications, pain,
and suffering will continue to pervade the process of undergoing surgery no
matter how advanced the field becomes. This is clearly evident, as all of us
have at least known someone close to them who has had to have an
operation. Surgery can save lives and,
in other cases, can just as easily take them. The surgeon’s duty is to give
their patients the best care, whether that means performing an operation or to
advising against it and recommending alternative solutions. The patient’s duty
is to decide if the doctor’s advice is sound and, if so, to trust it. Now, just imagine how hard it
is to trust someone with your life.
Now, do it again – but this time, imagine trusting
a robot with this responsibility…..
In 2000, Intuitive Surgical, Inc. introduced the FDA
approved da Vinci robotic surgical system. The system is composed of a
surgeon’s console, fitted with a high-resolution viewing screen and an
Endowrist system that reacts to the surgeon’s movements, and a patient
side-cart, equipped with four robotic arms capable of emulating the surgeon’s
movements almost exactly. Since 2000, over 1,400 da Vinci systems have been
purchased and successfully employed in hospitals from the United States to Austria.
At a price of around $2 Million, the da Vinci system represents an innovative,
but expensive approach to surgical procedures. While the price may seem steep,
sales have risen dramatically over the past few years and are expected to
increase by 400% next year. So why are more and more hospitals around the world
willing to pay so much for this system? For starters, the system allows
surgeons to perform minimally invasive procedures with more accuracy and
greater effectiveness. Rather than having to saw through someone’s mandible in
order to reach a cancerous mass in the back of someone’s throat, this system is
able to make a tiny incision in neck or even proceed directly down the throat
in order to reach the same malignancy. This not only reduces the trauma levels
inflicted to the patient, but also preserves tissue and dramatically reduces
recovery time. This saves the patient and the hospital lofty costs associated
with extended inpatient stays, increases patient satisfaction, and increases a
hospitals’ brand in terms of innovativeness. No wonder hospitals are jumping at
the chance to be the next institution to employ the da Vinci system in their
surgical centers, right? From the sounds of it, I would trust this thing more
than I would trust the Cleveland Browns to disappoint their fans (which is
pretty much guaranteed).
Now, here’s the other side of the story. The surgical robot
is not autonomous – it requires a surgeon who is not only comfortable
performing the operation remotely, through a screen, but who is also capable of
deftly maneuvering the Endowrist system well enough to make it react as if its
his own hands. In theory, this is how it’s supposed to work. This requires
hours and hours of training and even then, success is not guaranteed. In being
detached from the patients’ tissue, the surgeon will obviously have less
sensitivity. In some cases, this has resulted in mistakes that result in even
bigger problems than the initial surgery was meant to correct. In addition,
more and more cases are being reported as problematic as research begins to
surface regarding the da Vinci’s outcomes. So far, only 245 problematic
operations have been reported, according to the FDA. But, these problematic
cases are self-reported and as a result are vastly underreported. While the da
Vinci system is understandably an innovative approach to surgery in the 21st
century, it is far from a perfect machine. As I said before, every surgery
involves some sort of risk. The question is whether or not this robot is able
to minimize these risks effectively.
